Scarefest
Scarefest is the flagship (or rather, ghostship) event at Alton Towers during the month of October when it's, surprise surprise, HALLOWEEN.
The event is known to be immensely popular with TSTers for it means dressing up, playing Halloween tricks on fellow members (i.e. BOO!!) and re-riding many of the park's rides/rollercoasters in the dark. It also means the three Scare mazes are open so yay!
This event usually ends up spending most of the budget for Alton Towers, usually on decorations from Poundland.
Contents |
History
Tussauds got a little bit bored after dealing with a discovery behind an ancient bookcase in the very early 00s, so they sent out a group representing the company to travel the world and bring back amusing things with them, as executives can get bored very easily. They had tried contacting John Wardley to come and entertain them, but he was too busy trying to perfect flying for his new roller coaster with some plywood and chewing gum in HQ.
The company group travelled the world aimlessly, until finding out about the amazing, frightening and spectacular Terenzi Horror Nights at Europa Park and so decided to check it out. It took Tussauds a while to get them out of Mackland because it was so easily mesmerising (It's the land of the Roland, what do you expect with the 'tache?), but after a while they managed to bring back the group by promising an installation of a secret sports/entertainment room on park, most likely hidden behind the random door around Oblivion's drop.
After explaining what Europa was like with Terenzi creating a wholly spooky and fun experience, Tussauds decided to try out their own kind of haunted event, first naming it Halloween Spooktacular which was a very typical creative name indeed. This event involved hiring out all of the Halloween character costumes from the local costume shops, visiting every cheap shop for Halloween decorations to throw around the park and leaving the park open a bit later than usual so the enthusiasts can openly whore the roller coasters.
And people liked it!
Rinse and repeat until 2004, when Tussauds went through the Terrible Dark Ages Disease and had to halt everything fun for 3 years. This sadly included the Halloween event. But then, Merlin Entertainments Ltd came along and made everything better in 2007, bringing back the event and renaming it Scarefest as well creating new characters to roam the park and entertain the guests with their minions children.
And people liked it slightly more!
The Scarefest Tradition
This part of the article is to be about how TST celebrates on park, the varying amounts of Maze walkthroughs, the etiquette of dress-up and of course, how many times rides are re-ridden in the dark i.e. Congo River Rapids, Nemesis, Air, Oblivion and Th13teen.
Annual Attractions
It wouldn't be a Halloween events if there weren't Scare Mazes and themed attractions! Or at least a bit of plastic pumpkins here and there.
The Scare Mazes
- Terror of the Towers -
- sub species -
- The haunting of Molly Crowe -
- The Sanctuary - Retired
- Carnival of Screams - Retired
- The Field Of A Thousand Screams - Retired
- Room 13 - Retired
- Boiler House - Retired
The scarezones
- dark apocalypse -
- nox infernus -
- scary tales zone - Retired
- Zombies! Scare zone - Retired
The Ride: LIVE! (NOW RETIRED!)
- Skelvin's Haunted Adventure - In order to make families more interested in visiting, the park decided to make Duel live again to appeal to the child audience, only with less special effects, not-so-imposing actors and by removing the original Haunted House soundtrack with the Beetlejuice theme on an iTunes loop. In the process they made Skelvin the main character of it, putting his name in the title and featuring him in the pre-show videos... but not on the ride itself in any form, thus rendering his 'haunted adventure' pointless.
- Hex: LIVE - Retired
- Th13teen: LIVE - Retired
- Duel: LIVE - Retired
Misc. Attractions
- Trick or Treat Doors -
- Haunted Hollow: LIVE - Retired
Hotel Exclusives
- Trick or Treat Rooms -
- Room Th13teen - Replacement for the Scare Rooms trialled in 2007, guests brave enough to stay in room Th13teen hope to survive the night without succumbing to the Dark Forest. Not to be confused with the scare maze of the same name (albeit without a mix of letters and numbers) in 2006/7.
- Where's Waldey: Live - TSTers stalk John Wardley somewhere within the Alton Towers Hotel or the Splash Landings Hotel, normally within the realms of the lobby of the former. Extra points are/were awarded when enthusiasts guessed correctly on whom Wardley was with and where he was next going.
